


Painterly

by perceptivefics



Category: Homestuck
Genre: M/M, Pale Romance | Moirallegiance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-20
Updated: 2017-06-20
Packaged: 2018-11-16 14:00:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,901
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11254395
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/perceptivefics/pseuds/perceptivefics
Summary: Karkat is at his wit's end while Eridan mopes around his hive after a bad concupiscent break-up. He needs to do something to cheer the seadweller up - if only Eridan would let him.





	Painterly

**Author's Note:**

> Ooooof. Honesty up front: I have _never_ written Eridan before, and he is one of the trolls I am the least familiar with as far as characterization at the hands of my own fingertips. I did give it a solid effort though??
> 
> This is a gift for someone outside of AO3. Happy Belated Birthday, dude! You know who you are <3

"Jesus, Eridan!"

 

Karkat looked upon the current state of the common room in his hive with woeful disgust. The accumulation of about six days of trash, dirty clothes, and scattered books and DVDs littered the whole block from wall to wall. Not _his_ trash - if this were his _own_ pathetic doing, Karkat wouldn't have any problem with it. Hell, he might even _add_ to it, depending on his mood. But no. The flashy striped scarves, the emptied food containers that once held a suitable aquatic diet, the shitty troll noir films clogging up his lounging space...none of this questionably terrible bullshit was his. All of _that_ belonged to the sad, simpering violetblood currently curled up on his couch underneath his favorite pale blue, crab-print blanket, (that _prick!_ ) looking for all the world like he'd just had his shame-globes surgically removed.

 

With a conviction that only Karkat Vantas could possess, he marched right over, kicking aside any hazardous things like scarves or boxes that might threaten to trip him on his way through. Then he stood in front of the couch, hands on his soft, wide hips, giving Eridan the most judgmental glare he could muster.

 

"Hey," he piped.

 

Eridan slowly uncovered his head from under the blanket and peered at Karkat with tired eyes. He squinted because his glasses were sitting just above his head; the little shit must have been napping. He glubbed and bubbled in disdain, then tried to disappear back under the blanket. Karkat prevented this by immediately grabbing it and ripping it away from Eridan's body.

 

"Hey!!" Cried the leaner troll, halfway to a whiny moan. "I was usin' that!"

 

"It's _mine,_ you sniveling thief, and I'm taking it back!"

 

"Yeah, but I was the one that went an' gave it to ya!" Eridan growled, "I can use it if I wanna!"

 

"Real nice. Taking back the perfectly good pale gifts you gave me to comfort your own super-bruised ego."

 

"Fuck you!"

 

"I’m good, thanks." Karkat replied, quick to the draw. _Just in case_ Eridan was in one of his swinging sort of quadrant moods. It happened way more often than Karkat liked after another one of his flimsy break-ups - and whoever swung the hammer this time, it looked like a _bad_ fallout. Better to play safe than sorry. He shook his blanket at Eridan while the other set his glasses back on his face, glaring as he pushed them into place on the bridge of his nose.

 

"Listen." Karkat lectured, "I suffered through one of the worst strifes of my short existence and a _lot_ of fucking effort to get my lusus out of here on a wild goose chase for an extended period of time. Literal blood, sweat, and yes, sometimes even _tears_ went into my brilliant plan to get us alone in my hive! Because _you_ looked at me - kinda like you're doing right now - and practically pissed all over the floor like a jealous barkbeast at the thought of having him sidling around during your visit!"

 

"So?"

 

Karkat inhaled once through his nose, then huffed sharply. " _So,_ I assumed we'd be doing some kind of feelings jam or, you know, doing something other than laying around the hive! Because _God only knows_ you've put off enough vibes since you stormed through my front door _unannounced_ that you, Eridan Ampora, have _yet again_ failed to maintain a stable concupiscent quadrant!" He threw the blue crab blanket at Eridan (who caught it with a small amount of shock) and finished: "But instead you've just been hogging up space in my recuperacoon, making a mess of my block for almost a week and feeling sorry for yourself! Well, guess what, fucker? I'm done with it!"

 

Eridan sneered at him as he bundled the crab blanket in his lap, squeezing it under anxious palms. "What're you gonna do?" He demanded. "Ya gonna kick me out? Make me walk all'a way back to my hive?"

 

"Surprisingly, no!" Karkat replied at a growl. He jabbed a finger at Eridan meaningfully. "I'm going to make you stay and help me clean up all this _shit_ you've tossed around my block. It looks like a fucking gale-force storm front passed through here, and we've got maybe another day or two until my lusus wises up and skitters back home. If he sees the mess you've made, all hell is gonna break loose. Do you fancy having your auricular sponge clots blown out by the sounds of hellish, clattering screeching that only a pincer-handed devil-beast can produce?"

 

His fin-eared guest started to squawk in protest, then thought about it, and clamped down with a groan.

 

“Thought so,” said Karkat. “Now get your _ass_ off my couch and get to cleaning.” When Eridan answered by curling up tighter in the same spot, Karkat flashed one of the most furious looks Eridan had ever seen. “I swear, if you don’t start double-timing it, I’ll _drag_ you into action.”

 

The simple displeasure of his temporary hive-host was all Eridan needed, really. The seadweller flailed and sputtered as he stood from the couch in a single abrupt motion. “Okay! Oh- _kay!_ I get it! Fuck!”

 

Satisfied, Karkat immediately went to work collecting up all the empty food containers to dump them, while Eridan slouched around the block gathering his clothes. He even found a few of his rings that had gone missing in the piles; how about that. “And when we’re done,” added Karkat, “We’re gonna sit the fuck down and have a proper goddamn pale session.”

 

Eridan immediately _whined._ “I _said_ I don’t wanna glubbin’ _talk_ about it!”

 

Karkat rolled his eyes, tossing empty cups and paper boxes into the common block trash receptacle with a groan. “Yeah, I already know that, ‘cause every time I try to initiate things you make a huge scene about it!”

 

“Then why’re ya makin’ me do it?!” Eridan complained, “Why ya gotta crack me open like a clam before I’m all ready?!”

 

“Fuck’s sake.” Karkat muttered, before blasting back, “Eridan, at this point, I don’t care what put you here. You don’t wanna talk about it? Fine, we don’t have to talk about it. But I’m not going to let you hang around my hive like the lingering stink of an oinkbeast’s shit-pile without us doing _something_ to snap you out of this slump!”

 

Eridan, carefully folding up one of his spare scarves - a way for him to delay his half of the cleaning, no doubt, but also because he really coveted those dumb clothes - blinked back at Karkat in silence, a pause passing over the space. He kept collecting up his clothes, while Karkat snatched up more empty containers, watching the other walking around as something clicked.

 

And Karkat looked up to see heartbreak in Eridan’s face.

 

He slouched. “Oh, no.” He grumbled, tone gentling by a hair. “What?”

 

“I mean.” Eridan stammered - goddammit, Karkat felt those pale strings stretching taut in his pusher - and asked, “S’it really so bad that I’ve been hangin’ around? Like...I. We watched a couple’a movies together. I been all snuggly and stuff. It’s nice an’ cozy in your recuperacoon when we’re sleepin’ together. Ain’t we been kinda pale all week anyway?”

 

Karkat _sighed,_ his anger breaking like the dissolution of a thundering storm. He pinched at the bridge of his nose, rubbing his palm down over his face. “No, no, God. I don’t mean it like that. Don’t start getting all wibbly on me. I can’t stand it when you make that face.”

 

“I just - I ain’t ready, Kar.” Eridan told him. He set aside a well-folded scarf and started to fiddle with the gaudy gold bands decorating his fingers. “I _wanted_ t’do the proper thing, honest. I kept gearin’ myself up for it, gettin’ ready, but every time I did it just didn’t stick, y’know?”

 

“Yeah, well.” Karkat gave him a look. “Kinda felt like you were just skirting around the whole kit and kaboodle ‘cause you just weren’t feeling - uh. _Us._ ”

 

“No no no!” Eridan cried, “No, I’m sorry! I am! I’m so feelin’ it, it’s just. Just.”

 

Karkat thought to himself in that moment that, really, he should know better by now. For all the flaunting, bragging, and constant dramatic complaints, Eridan was a lot of hot air coupled with excessive posturing half the time. The way he flitted around from space to space demanding attention worked only as long as he maintained his own fragile self-confidence. When it came to opening up about his own issues, he shut down _fast._ But they had been making such good progress! Karkat got him to at least yammer on a _little_ about what upset him the last few times! He thought maybe having Eridan around for a face-to-face session with just the two of them would’ve finally worked out. But, apparently, that was not so.

 

Eridan’s saving grace was that he was a surprisingly good listener when the tables were flipped. It was the sole reason Karkat stuck it out this long in the first place; because it wasn’t that Eridan didn’t bring anything to the quadrant. It still came with some of his standard issues - sometimes he could be a bit selfish - but he had very little trouble holding up his end of the diamond. Karkat had dealt with a lot worse in his own pale department. For the most part, he knew he could confide in the other troll whenever he had to and that his feelings wouldn’t be dismissed. They even had a little bit of overlap when it came to their taste in entertainment, although the margin itself was quite small.

 

It was just...trying to get Eridan over this hump of actually speaking up about the things that bothered him.

 

But Karkat could be patient about that, too, he supposed. He knew a thing or two about wanting to keep things inside, no matter what. Nice as this arrangement had been over the past half a sweep or so, he still didn’t trust Eridan enough to open up about the one thing he dreaded discussing the most.

 

Karkat wasn’t sure if he ever would. But he tried to stay hopeful. Things could change, after all.

 

“So do you feel like talking about it _now?_ ” He checked, arching an eyebrow at the seadweller as he waited for a response.

 

Eridan thought about it. Karkat could see the gears clicking and turning around in his pan. Then, biting on his bottom lip, he admitted: “Kinda...not really. No.”

 

Karkat sighed. Eridan could smell the disappointment on him, but he also knew by the other’s posture that he was out of the danger zone. “Fine,” he agreed. “But you can’t just spend the rest of your visit moping on my couch. We need something that’s gonna get you out of my hive and back in the game.”

 

“Well...like what?” Wondered Eridan, who truly didn’t think he ever _could_ get back in the game, after what happened.

 

His chubby, soft quadrant-mate squared his shoulders with a grumble. Time to bounce ideas until something stuck. “I don’t know. Watching another movie? A better one maybe?”

 

“Mmmno.” Eridan fidgeted with his rings, then started to set aside more dirty clothes. “Been watchin’ a lotta movies.”

 

“Music?” Karkat tried. “Jam session, like, listening to some tunes?”

 

Eridan considered it, then shook his head. “Uh-uh.”

 

Karkat, _struggling_ not to get frustrated: “Play a game?”

 

“Don’t feel like games.”

 

He started tapping on his hip, and grunted. “Play a _video_ game?”

 

“That’s still a game! And no. I had a look at what you got an’ I ain’t feelin’ none’a those.”

 

Karkat flung his hands up. “Welp! That was _my_ brilliant list of ideas, what’s yours?”

 

Eridan leaned his head back and released a low, bubbling moan. Karkat immediately pointed to him with a growl. “Don’t you start, dude! You shot down everything I had so now it’s your turn. Start brainstorming.”

 

Eridan puffed his cheeks out as he sighed, wringing a shirt under his hands while he considered some options. Karkat picked up more around the space while he waited, though he occasionally glanced over to the other troll. Eventually - at a time when Karkat _wasn’t_ looking - something struck him. “Can it be anythin’ I want?”

 

What a stupid question. Why was he asking that? “Yeah, duh, fuck-face.” Karkat replied, words devoid of any actual angry bite. “Whatever the hell you wanna do. Just pick something before we both die of old age.”

 

The next time Karkat looked up, his ears pricked up and he chirped, freezing in one place, because Eridan had eyes on him and for some reason he was looking almost _devilish._ Wary, Karkat turned his head to one side, eyeing him with suspicion. “What?” He demanded.

 

Eridan’s over-black lips split into a wide grin, showing off rows of serrated seadweller’s teeth that had Karkat pushing back his basic fight-or-flight instincts for half a second. The other troll went for an ornate bag he brought with him which he’d used to carry over all his belongings for the trip and the hive visit, and went rummaging around for a moment or two. When he found what he wanted, Eridan held up a very intricate, expensive-looking purple box with a gold inlay around the edges depicting seashells, various fish, and some ocean waves.

 

Karkat stared at it, and felt like he may soon regret his previous answer. “What the hell is that?” He asked.

 

“Come ova here an’ siddown an’ you’ll see,” Eridan replied.

 

* * *

  

Some struggling, negotiating, and half an hour of work later, Karkat sat on the couch while Eridan merrily pressed an inky black gloss to Karkat’s bottom lip. All of his focus went into making sure the application was _just so,_ leaning in and tipping Karkat’s chin up a bit to the dim ceiling lights to make sure it was right.

 

Karkat stayed stone-still, though Eridan could feel him vibrating with the innate desire to protest. And, finally unable to hold it in, Karkat muttered aloud behind stiff lips and clenched teeth: “I cannot believe.”

 

“Quiiit. I ain’t done yet.” Eridan said, dipping the applicator in his gloss tube and gently putting it to Karkat’s mouth again. Karkat found himself remarking in private how the hell Eridan and Kanaya could wear all this stuff day in and day out - it felt like he had a second skin latexed onto his face. He wasn’t a fan of the sensation. Eridan _insisted_ he wasn’t using a lot, that he wasn’t packing on the product, but Karkat thought that surely there had to be _some_ packing happening for how much his face felt like it was covered in powder and whatever the hell else.

 

He spoke again, teeth staying clacked together, and he tried to do so without moving his lips too much - which was obviously very difficult, given the nature of talking. “Eridan, do me a favor. The next time I hand you free reign to do quote-unquote _anything you want,_ just slap me around a little bit until I get the sense knocked back into me.”

 

“Awww, but Kar!” Eridan cooed, smiling from ear to ear. “Ya look so good!”

 

“Bullshit. I bet I look like a fucking circus act.” Karkat complained, “Just stick me in a ridiculous outfit and ship me off to Gamzee. I’m practically converted already.”

 

Eridan sniffed and tipped his chin up in one of his very superior sort of gestures. “Don’t you go comparin’ my work wiv that fuckin’ joker, now.” He said, “It ain’t like I’m just throwin’ on some paint an’ callin’ it a day.”

 

“My face feels like I’m going through my next molt and I can’t get the old skin to scratch off.” Karkat said. He reached up to touch his face; Eridan smacked his hand away.

 

“Don’t! You’ll ruin it.”

 

Karkat _whined._ “Hurry the fuck up then will you? I’m fucking dying over here. I hate how this feels!”

 

“You’ll thank me when you look in the mirror,” insisted Eridan, grabbing up a tube of - what the fuck was that? What the hell was it? Karkat didn’t know, but the next thing he knew he was being told to “Look up. And don’t blink.”

 

“Are you serious?”

 

Eridan _sighed,_ eyes rolling as he repeated it. “Fuckin’ look up and don’t fuckin’ blink!”

 

Karkat, with a bitter noise, tentatively turned his gaze to the ceiling. However, the minute he saw a dash of movement towards his face, he jerked back. “What are you doing? Is that thing going near my _eyes?_ ”

 

“ _Yeah,_ Kar, it’s gotta go near your eyes.”

 

“Oh _hell_ no!” Karkat regarded the jet-black pencil with absolute horror. “You are not sticking anything from that hellish item box of yours near my precious look-stalks! I remember torture films! I know how this goes!”

 

“You seriously think I’m plottin’ to jab your eyes out with a pencil?” Eridan challenged. “Not gonna do anything malicious, here. Just hold still an’ it’ll be fine. If you _move,_ now _that_ might cause a problem.”

 

Karkat, unable to find room or gumption to argue, reluctantly went back to his previous sitting position, including his head turned up a bit and looking at the ceiling per Eridan’s instruction. He, once again, made a conscious effort to move as little as possible. Eridan gently brushed the tip of the pencil along Karkat’s bottom lids in feather-light strokes that had him clutching his feet in terror. All he could think was _don’t fucking move you asshole, if you move then you can kiss your sight goodbye._

 

When Eridan finished with that, he told Karkat to tip his head forward and look _down._ Karkat hesitated, but followed orders eventually, and those same soft pencil-strokes returned, but this time on his upper lids. He made a low noise from the pit of his chest and Eridan laughed. “An’ you call _me_ the dramatic one.”

 

“Fuck you,” Karkat muttered. “I am sitting pretty and letting you put all this shit on my face because I’m so pale for you it should be considered illegal. Terezi should arrest me on the spot for how absolutely pathetic I am. Appreciate my goddamn gesture, jackass.”

 

“Not yet.” Eridan replied, and Karkat could hear the smile in his voice.

 

Thankfully, there wasn’t much else to do after that particular harrowing trial, apparently. Within moments, Eridan capped the last item he’d used, looked upon his good work, and beamed. “Okay, yer done! Wanna see?”

 

Karkat blinked rapidly a couple of times, not used to the feeling of wearing eyeliner. Or _anything_ else Eridan put on his face, really. “No,” he grunted.

 

“Awww c’mon!” Eridan begged as he put away his materials, “You look good! I promise! The whole point of wearin’ this shit is so you _don’t_ feel ugly while you’re in it.”

 

Karkat leered at him. “I don’t need you to remind me of how hideous I am.”

 

“Kar, that ain’t what I meant.” Eridan groaned, “An’ you’re not _hideous._ C’mon, one little peek in a mirror?”

 

It didn’t look like he had much choice, since the seadweller was already reaching for a compact mirror that _also_ called his item box home. What the fuck else did he have in there? Karkat thought that with all the shit he pulled out he surely must have run out of room, but it was like a fucking interdimensional pocket space. Karkat half expected Eridan to reach in and pull out a whole hopbeast, even with his weirdly adamant disgust of magic.

 

He sighed, and held out his hand. “Fine, give it here.”

 

There was a noise that escaped Eridan in that moment which Karkat could only describe as _delight._ It was higher than his usual pitch and a bit watery from his wavetongue accent as he handed Karkat the palm-sized little mirror. At first, Karkat squeezed his eyes shut and regarded the thing with hesitation, gearing himself up for the monstrous vision Eridan had transformed him into. Though when he finally opened his eyes and looked, Karkat...found himself quite shocked.

 

“...Holy shit.” He breathed.

 

“Right?!” Eridan cried, already leaning forward in hopes of hearing something more than stunned mumbling.

 

Karkat brought the mirror closer and turned his head this way and that, observing his reflection. He almost didn’t recognize it as his own - the soft round shape of his face was there, and those were all of his features, but he looked almost like an entirely different person. His complexion had magically smoothed out, and Karkat wondered how Eridan managed to make all of the pockmarks and stress scars in his skin disappear. His mouth was _black_ \- blacker than its natural black, _somehow._ His eyes had a similar black lining around them that made the yellow of his sclera pop. Looking at it now, in all actuality, it _was_ a lot less than he thought it was. Still, the impact was undeniable.

 

And Karkat...didn’t know how he felt about it. His thick eyebrows (Eridan had tweezed them, which he _hated,_ but they still held their original shape) pressed together as he judged his own face. “I…”

 

Eridan was fidgeting with his hands in anticipation. “D’ya like it?” He asked.

 

Karkat, at a loss for a response, ended up letting Eridan lead him along. “Um, yeah, amazingly.”

 

“See!” The seadweller nudged him. “Makes ya look fuckin’ hot, right?”

 

With less conviction, Karkat replied, “Yeahhh. Totally.”

 

There was a short pause. Eridan scooted closer on the couch and brought the mirror down, then nudged their foreheads together in a pale gesture that had Karkat fighting back a blush. “S’okay, Kar. Ya don’t gotta like yourself right away.”

 

That was what made it click for Karkat. In that moment, he realized that the pale sensations practically embossed into his pusher were a lot more on track than he realized. Their understanding of one another in certain aspects was more two-way than he first considered: Eridan _knew him_ in ways the other trolls in their little group didn’t quite grasp yet over Trollian conversations. Karkat wasn’t sure how he picked up on it - had he slipped at any point? - but that mattered very little. What counted was that he’d noticed Karkat in the first place.

 

Karkat thought he might have felt little inklings of red when he thought about it too hard. He shoved it aside viciously as Eridan pulled back. “But ya gotta keep wearin’ that all day until you’re feelin’ it,” he said.

 

“Goddammit.” Karkat grumbled, “You’re asking a lot of me to keep all this crap on my face. I sat still for you like a good little troll, isn’t that enough?”

 

Eridan, with a smile, squared his shoulders and puffed out his chest proudly. “Nope! Gotta wear it!”

 

He _sighed._ “Well, I guess it would be pretty fucked up of me to just immediately wash this shit off after you worked so hard on it, so I guess I’m stuck with it for the day.”

 

Eridan’s smile got a little wider then. He laughed, looking happy with himself for the first time in six days. Karkat flashed a tiny, lopsided smirk in return, less confident but just as sincere.

 

Eridan Ampora was a stupid, selfish, pretentious asshole - but he was _Karkat’s_ stupid, selfish, pretentious asshole. Woe upon any fucker who might think to break the poor hopeless bastard’s heart again.


End file.
